


stuffy noses (strep throat, swollen eyes)

by destroyallmonsters



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Multi, Other, Polyamory, Sickfic, and everyone loves sam, blink and you miss it reference to nonbinary bucky, everyone loves sam's mom, this has no plot whatsoever but it's cute so take it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-10
Updated: 2017-02-10
Packaged: 2018-09-23 08:44:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9648500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/destroyallmonsters/pseuds/destroyallmonsters
Summary: “Ugh,” is all Sam can say. “I miss Mama’s chicken soup right now.”“The be-all, cure-all,” Sarah muses. “Jesus, you look terrible. Aren’t your boyfriends helping you out any?”Oh, boy, are they ever.





	

As soon as Sam starts coughing, dread hits him harder and faster than the cold itself could ever dream to.

 

Sam hasn’t been feeling his best lately, is the thing. The constant nightmares lead to lack of sleep, and lack of sleep opens himself up to all kinds of wonderful diseases. He’s back in the States, he gets to chat with his mama and sister and nephew again, that’s great, but the government still has their fucking eye on him and being cooped up in the safe house is driving him nuts.

 

He retches his way through the video chat with Sarah and Jody, to the point where Jody asks, “Mommy, is Uncle Sam dying?” 

 

“Not yet, baby,” Sam manages to respond, and Sarah hushes him.

 

“Sam,” she scolds, and ruffles Jody’s curly hair. “No, sweetie, he’s just a little sick.”

 

“I can imagine it’ll be more than a little soon.” Sam’s chuckle devolves into another fit.

 

Sarah sighs, tries to rein in Jody’s squirming. “Sam, you seriously need to start taking care of yourself.” 

 

“Ugh,” is all Sam can say. “I miss Mama’s chicken soup right now.”

 

“The be-all, cure-all,” Sarah muses. “Jesus, you look terrible. Aren’t your boyfriends helping you out any?”

 

Oh, boy, are they ever.

 

Bucky stares at him whenever he hacks and retches. Sam can’t help but stare back. It’s just a cold; it’s winter, don’t super soldiers know regular god damn human beings get colds around this time of year? Bucky’s gaze is focused, but his expression is completely unreadable, like he’s trying to decipher something and has to keep his emotions a secret.

 

Steve kisses him just fine, since he can’t get the common cold anyway. Bucky, however, kisses him chaste, doesn’t put a lot of effort into it. Stares at him long after they break it. Bucky is so fucking weird sometimes, Sam has no idea how he fell for him, let alone Steve, too.

 

He gets it, brain damage, no socialization or chance for propriety for seventy years; Sam’s dealt with vets with TBIs on (slightly) similar scales. But Bucky seemed to be doing okay adapting back into the land of the living again, so what gives?

 

Bucky knocks on the bedroom door with his carbon fiber hand, making the wood ring against the hinge. Sam manages a weak “come in” before Bucky barges right in and drops a bag of Hall’s near his face.

 

“Here’s some cough drops,” is all Bucky says as he turns to leave.

 

Sam doesn’t even get a chance to react.

 

He coughs and coughs but there isn’t much of a reaction after Bucky bursting through the door like he’s the damn Kool-Aid mascot. Steve, as always, lets it be, but with a worried look on his face. Sometimes Sam coughs on purpose to get their attention, but there isn’t much response. Not that Sam  _ wants  _ his partners to coddle him, but  _ something  _ would be better than what he’s got now, which is a bag of disgusting cough drops and Steve’s ever-so-helpful puppy dog eyes.

 

Soon enough, the cough moves upward into a pounding headache and sharp fangs gnawing at the small of his back. Sam lets out a groan as he squirms on the threadbare couch, trying to slide into a comfortable position, but fuck, no part of his body is comfortable, it all feels like it’s on fire with the way it aches and sweats.

 

“Getting sick again?” Steve asks with an empathetic lilt to his voice, idling near the safehouse’s flat screen TV that probably costs something more Sam’s weekly paycheck.

 

“As if it wasn’t so damn obvious,” Sam says. Steve shrugs, sits down next to him, starts rubbing a hand along his calf.

 

“Um,” Steve starts, “anything I can do to help?”

 

Sam just chuckles, rolls onto his stomach. “Yeah. Back massage.”

 

Steve obliges and begins to knead along the crease in Sam’s back where his spine dips. Sam bites his lip to avoid making a noise and setting off Steve’s flip switch libido. If Steve wasn’t already taking art classes at the local community college and helping out at the VA, Sam would offer that he become some kind of masseuse.

 

Steve just isn’t that perceptive of a person, not like Bucky, or maybe even Sam himself. He can be helpful, resourceful, even-- the way his knuckles were pressing down on Sam’s flesh and ebbing some of the pain away proved that much --but it took him a while to catch on to his partners’ ailments. When they were driving all across North and Central America to find their eventual third datemate, Steve would look befuddled when Sam would catch the flu or norovirus or some other god forsaken hell illness. He’d bring Sam in to the doctor, buy him all the necessary antibiotics and horse pills, but only after Sam prompted he do so.

 

Sam guesses it was because Steve was always too busy taking care of himself to take care of others. But that was an assumption. And an inference from obsessively reading biographies. Sam just had a hunch.

 

Steve kneads out a knot just between Sam’s shoulder blades and Sam lets out a load groan. That’s approximately the same time that Bucky pads into the kitchen.

 

“Not on the couch, for the love of God, not on the damn couch.” Bucky’s tone is monotone as ever, but the vague forlornness in the way he says it makes Sam laugh.

 

“Ease up, Buck, I’m just giving him a massage.” Steve pulls away from Sam’s back, but his legs still straddle his hips. “How was your nap?”

 

“ _ Ah-ah, _ I didn’t say you were finished,” Sam grabs Steve by the wrist, contorting his body, pulling the blond back down.

 

Bucky hums. “Dreamt I was a dinosaur.”

 

Steve chuckles. “Really?”

 

“No.” Bucky shuffles through the refrigerator. “Where’s the fucking chicken stock?”

 

“It’s in--”

 

“Nevermind, I found it.” He slams it on the counter and turns on the stove. Sam assumes he’s making some leftover chicken breast or something. It’s three in the afternoon, so it’s not for dinner.

 

“Aw, Buck, that’s sweet,” Steve croons, half-teasing, “making chicken soup for Sam.”

 

Wait a second. “Bucky,” Sam says, “did you overhear my conversation with my sister earlier?”

 

“No, obviously I couldn’t hear, what with my not-enhanced hearing and the fact that you talk so quietly,” Bucky says.

 

Ignoring Bucky’s sarcasm, it clicks in Sam’s head. Bucky’s being  _ caring _ . In addition to Sam’s heady knowledge of Steve and Bucky’s life together in the almost-tenement crammed in on the corner of Hicks and Warren (from the biographies, alright, Sam was admittedly a bit obsessed with the Howlies in high school) Sam had heard from Steve that Bucky has  _ always  _ been a nurturing person-- he just has an unconventional way of nurturing people.

 

_ “He dragged me to a science convention after I got my nose punched in _ ,” Steve once said with a sigh.

 

Sam’s heart flutters just a tad. He really isn’t sure how he managed to fall in love with a guy he wasn’t too fond of just a handful of months earlier, but perhaps  _ this  _ is how. “That’s… awful sweet of you.”

 

Bucky shrugs, trying to conceal a smile. “I can be sweet.”

 

“‘ _ I can be sweet. _ ’ Get a load of this mook.” Steve laughs.

 

“Shut up, Rogers.” Bucky dices up some leftover chicken with that precise hand of his--his right one--and drops it into the pot with ease.

 

Sam kind of lays there for a few moments, letting Steve’s big paws knead at his back and the smell of chicken soup waft in the air. It took a little while, but his roommates aren’t half bad at this whole ‘taking care of their sick not-super soldier boyfriend’ thing. Sam certainly wasn’t counting the days. It was three days.

 

“C’mere,” Steve lifts Sam up by the cheek, tender, and presses a kiss to the side of his lips. Sam smiles into it. “Y’feel any better?”

 

“Much,” Sam says, feeling kind of sleepy right about now. Maybe Steve and Bucky wouldn’t mind if he falls asleep for a few moments. Black washes over his vision.

 

\--

 

When he starts back up, his head’s still a mess, and Bucky’s staring at him again.

 

“Soup’s ready,” Bucky announces with, actually, some enthusiasm. He’s made some for the three of them, set on the table in white bowls. Not like Steve and Bucky’s metabolisms mind any.

 

They sit down and eat in a comfortable silence.

 

“Taste like your ma’s?” Bucky asks.

 

Sam gives a half-smile through his spoonful. “Would it hurt your feelings if I say not really?” He swallows. “It’s still damn good, though.”

 

“Meh, good enough.” Bucky slurps his soup.

 

“What made your ma’s taste like it did?” Steve asks, curious.

 

“Dunno. She used some spices I’ve never heard of.” Sam doesn’t mind the menial conversation. It warms his belly along with the meal.

 

Bucky bites his lip. “Do you. Mind if I ask her? Would you be okay with that?” Sam and Steve both laugh. Bucky sputters, petulant. “I just wanna know the spices!”

 

“Just admit that you love my mom, Barnes.”

 

“She’s a neat lady,” Bucky defends.

 

Steve hums agreement. “We need to meet her sometime. Like, actually meet her.”

 

Sam’s stomach sinks, remembering that he hasn’t seen his mother in person in months. “Yeah. You do, huh.”

 

Steve looks like he’s want to apologize for getting the three of them stuck in this situation again, and Sam’s equally want to defend his own actions in Leipzig. They don’t say anything, and it’s back to silence.

 

When they’re finished with the soup, Sam isn’t tired enough to go back to sleep, but there’s not an iota of energy circulating in his body otherwise, so he compromises by curling up on the couch with Steve and Bucky and watching one of those David Attenborough nature documentaries. This one’s about the horn of Africa and its diverse biomes. Come to think of it, Wakanda did have some interesting weather. Sam’s got his head rested in Bucky’s lap, and Steve’s got his head on Bucky’s shoulder.

 

“Look, it’s you,” Bucky points at a heron flapping its wings at its rival, tempting a mate.

 

“That’s a heron,” Sam counters. “I thought I was a pigeon.”

 

Bucky attempts to shut Sam up by picking him up and kissing him. Steve makes a disapproving noise.

 

“Buck, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

 

Bucky looks at him like he has two heads. “Why?”

 

Steve looks at him like he’s got three. “Because you can catch whatever he’s got?”

 

Now Sam’s joined in on the weird gazing. “I don’t think that’s even possible, Steve. Besides, he didn’t even use tongue.”

 

“I didn’t even use tongue,” Bucky echoes.

 

Steve squirms. It looks like he wants to say something, but then Bucky interrupts him.

 

“Ooh, Stevie, it’s you.” Bucky’s now pointing at a honey badger fighting off an enemy leopard, David Attenborough explaining the animal’s tenacity and willingness to fight whatever crosses its path.

 

“Sounds about right,” Sam agrees.

 

“Then what are you?” Steve asks, a bit challenging. Seems as though he’d lost his train of thought.

 

Bucky cocks his head, really thinking about it. After a moment, he points again to a gelada baboon, a nasty thing, with a wild mane and curled lips. “That one,” he says. “The baboon. It’s got my hair.”

 

They all laugh. Sam’s back down on Bucky’s lap, and Sam’s heart warms with how Bucky’s laughter makes his whole body shake, just like Steve’s does. Bucky’s carbon hand, warm from touch, presses light on Sam’s cheek. Steve reaches out with his own hand to hold Sam’s.

 

Yeah. Sam’s gonna be fine.

 

\--

 

Sam is not going to be fine.

 

Whatever this cold it, it’s coming with one hell of a vengeance. The heat and cold sweat has been replaced with freezing chills that make every part of his body vibrate, his teeth grinding and clattering. Sam feels like he’s been spending his entire life on this couch, away from Steve and Bucky cuddling him back to warmth. He’s so cold. He’s so damned cold.

 

“Fucking hell, I’m so  _ cold _ ,” he says.

 

Steve’s out on a run, so his furnace of a body is of no help at the moment. That leaves only Bucky, who is immediately alerted by Sam’s announcement, and he comes running over with his heated blanket.

 

“Here,” Bucky says, wrapping Sam up and turning it high enough so that it’ll ease the chills, but it won’t burn him, too. Bucky always has it on high, draped around his shoulders like a cape; all the cryo made his body temperature tepid.

 

“God bless you,” is all Sam can say. Bucky stands there, looking like Steve, as most of Sam’s chills seem to ebb away.

 

“Can I,” Bucky starts, “Uh.”

 

“Spit it out, Barnes.”

 

Bucky doesn’t reply, but instead moves to curl around Sam and the blanket and snuggle in. His lukewarm skin isn’t much help, but the gesture warms Sam right up. He can feel his body ease up on the shaking. 

 

“You’re adorable,” Sam can’t help but say. 

 

“My cuteness is vastly underappreciated,” Bucky agrees. He lets Sam tuck his head under his scratchy, stubbly chin. Sam’s pajama’ed legs shift and tangle with Bucky’s bare calves.

 

“You should’ve said something sooner. Jesus, you’re shaking like a leaf.” Bucky wraps both his arms and the blanket so that Sam can barely move.

 

Sam chuckles. “What are you, my mom?”

 

Before Sam and Bucky can both fall asleep, Steve barges the door open, panting like an overheated dog. The only way he gets that exerted is if he’s been working out for at least an hour. Had it been that long since the chills woke Sam up?

 

“That was good,” Steve says half to himself in between heavy breaths. He’s probably dripping sweat all over the hardwood floor; Sam can’t see. “Sam? You awake?”

 

“Mrrrgh,” Sam replies, muffled by Bucky’s sort of pudgy physique curled around him.

 

Steve walks over to the couch, probably warmed by the sight of his partners cuddled up to each other. Unless Steve’s still on that strange idea that Bucky can somehow get a cold.

 

“Buck, seriously, give him some space,” Steve chides. “He’s still contagious.”

 

Oh. So he is.

 

“Y’re not my ma,” Bucky snarls through lingering exhaustion. Poor guy’s brain damage has him sleep twelve hours a day, every day. “Sam w’s cold. S’I’m warming him up.”

 

“He has your blanket; he’s fine,” Steve points out.

 

Bucky moves his head to most likely glare at Steve. Steve most likely fixes him with an arched “Bucky, no” eyebrow. Bucky’s eyebrow arches back in a “Bucky, yes” challenge. Their relationship now is almost like a reverse of what Sam had heard it used to be.

 

“Buck,” Steve begins, “You can still get sick. I know it.”

 

“No, I can’t,” Bucky counters. “I know my body and the serum better than you do, Steve.”

 

Sam feels it’s appropriate to interject. “No offense, Barnes, but you didn’t remember half the stuff that was in your files.”

 

“I thought you were on my side!”

 

“Am I  _ ever  _ on your side?” Sam tries to squirm out of Bucky’s grasp, but Bucky won’t budge. “Steve, I hope you’re going somewhere with this.”

 

“I am,” Steve says, defensive. “Buck, do you remember that really harsh winter in the Pyrenees? When Falsworth’s tent nearly got buried under all that snow?”

 

“No?” Bucky’s eyes narrow. “You expect me to?”

 

Steve sighs, but continues. “Well, this was obviously  _ after _ Zola gave you the serum. You,” Steve takes a breath, “got a strain of flu that damn well almost killed you. Took you out of service for two weeks.”

 

The room goes silent.

 

“The Soviets could’ve given me more serum,” Bucky counters.

 

“They didn’t,” Steve says. “What Zola gave you was potent enough. It was in the files.”

 

“Oh,” Sam says, remembering that line in the paper.

 

“Oh,” Bucky echoes Sam, his carbon hand fixing into  a fist.

 

“Yeah.” Steve mulls around awkwardly.

 

It all goes downhill from there.

 

\--

 

It certainly goes more downhill for Sam, that’s for sure. He’s called the doctor, been prescribed some potent antibiotics, groused about the growing price of health in this country, how fucking Wakanda of all places had free healthcare. If he didn’t feel so unwelcome in that isolationist paradise, he’d certainly have stayed.

 

Ugh. He’d thought he’d get sick, but not  _ sick.  _ This isn’t a cold that can be remedied with massages and cuddles, he genuinely needs rest.

 

“Barnes,” Sam calls from the couch that he’s probably stuck to by now, “make me some more soup.” He’s too tired and pained to throw in a  _ please. _

 

Bucky doesn’t respond.

 

“He’s sleeping,” Steve explains.

 

“Now? It’s almost six,” Sam points at his watch. Their partner normally sleeps in the afternoon, when he’s bored and the fatigue gets the better of him.

 

Steve shrugs. “He can do whatever he wants at that point.”

 

Bucky sticks to routine, Steve and Sam both know that. Unless.

 

Aw,  _ shit. _

 

Just like how it’d be in a sitcom, they both hear coughing.

 

Steve throws back his head and groans. “I  _ hate  _ being right.”

 

Sam drags both his sweaty hands down his sweaty face. “Looks like you’re in charge of soup,  _ dear. _ ”

 

Bucky eventually comes out of the bedroom, hacking away, looking like John Wick did when the bad guys killed his puppy. It hit him faster than Sam had imagined it would, if it was even possible, and Steve  _ was  _ right, which he was, the bastard.

 

“I am going to strangle you, Steve Rogers,” Bucky attempts to say before doubling over and coughing up his entire respiratory system.

 

Steve throws his hands in the air. “Why is it my fault? I warned you, and you didn’t listen!”

 

“You should’ve said it earlier, when I was kissing on Sam.”

 

“I thought you’d have remembered that time. You’re doing so well remembering things.” Steve suddenly looks melancholy. That inner bleeding heart of Sam’s feels a pang.

 

“Yeah, yeah, most of the time.” Bucky wipes the drool off of his mouth and flops down on the couch. “Can I kiss on Sam now that we’re both sick? I don’t  _ remember  _ how it works.”

 

“Hell no. When’s the last time you’ve gotten sick, Barnes? Jesus.” Sam wriggles away from him, into the arms of Steve, who’s immune to the flu as a damn android.

 

Bucky pouts. “Probably that time in the Pyrenees. HYDRA pumped with benzos and shit.”

 

There’s an awkward silence after that. Bucky looks regretful that he said that.

 

“I’m gonna attempt to make you guys some soup,” Steve announces as he gets up and walks to the stove.

 

Sam sighs and reclines in his pile of sweat. Bucky turns to look at him.

 

“Steve ever cook you anything when you guys were looking for me?” he asks.

 

“We always ate out,” Sam responds. He finds himself smiling at a flash of nostalgia and White Castle.

 

“You’re in for a world of pain and misery,” Bucky says, matter of fact.

 

\--

 

A few days have passed and Sam does feel a bit better, but not much. He’s at least well enough to call his mother. He’s surprised to find that his mother has discovered how to Facetime, and he’s delighted to see her face again, even if it is pixelated.

 

“Hi, baby,” Darlene greets him. “I heard you weren’t feeling so well.”

 

“Hi, mama. I’m hanging in there.” He gives a watery smile. God, he just wants to hug his mother again.

 

“Aren’t we all, Sammy.” His mother gives a hearty chuckle, raspy and old-sounding. Sam had forgotten how quickly his mother has been aging. “How are my big boys doing?”

 

“Steve and Bucky? They’re alright. Well, Steve’s alright.”

 

“What about James? What happened to that poor thing?”

 

Sam’s about to reply when he hears the familiar thunder of footsteps coming his way to the bedroom.

 

It’s Bucky, of course, looking like Hell itself. Good becomes great, bad becomes worse. “Is that Darlene?” Steve peeks out the door after him. “I wanna see Darlene.”

 

“God, Buck, you really do love Sam’s ma.”

 

“Oh, is that them? Bring ‘em over here, Sammy.” Darlene beckons the screen with a wrinkly hand.

 

Steve and Bucky shuffle in and crowd around Sam’s phone, eager as ever.

 

“Oh, James, you look awful. Sammy spend too much time with you?”

 

“Mom!” Sam squawks.

 

Bucky chuffs, a rumble in his throat. “The other way around is more like it, Darlene.”

 

“It’s good to see you,” Steve says, sweet. Darlene laughs and blows a kiss to the camera.

 

Sam steps back a bit, lets his partners be interrogated by his busybody mother. He thinks about what Sarah asked him two weeks ago.

 

Yeah. He’s doing just fine. His partners are here to help him out.

**Author's Note:**

> this is a silly thing i wrote to take a break from my novel! these goofballs are super fun to write, so expect perhaps a few more fics of their adventures soon. i don't use tumblr much so hit me up on my [twitter](twitter.com/shillyyshally) instead. cheers!


End file.
